US STOCKS-Wall St tops new highs on Democrat-driven stimulus hopes

* Weekly jobless claims dip unexpectedly
* DXC jumps on $10 bln takeover offer from French rival
* Indexes up: Dow up 0.88%, S&P 500 up 1.57%, Nasdaq down
2.48%

(Adds comment, Pelosi calls for Trump removal)
By Herbert Lash
Jan 7 (Reuters) - Stocks on Wall Street hit record levels on
Thursday as investors bet a Democrat-controlled Congress will
deliver more stimulus spending to help the U.S. economy overcome
a steep pandemic-induced downturn.
The Dow, S&P 500 and Nasdaq all set new highs amid growing
calls for President Donald Trump's removal, one day after Trump
supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in a harrowing assault on
American democracy. U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called for Trump's immediate
removal from office through the 25th Amendment. President-elect
Joe Biden accused Trump of fomenting violence and said Wednesday
was one of the darkest days in U.S.
history. "The market is now looking past Trump and it's looking
forward to a Biden presidency, more structure and stimulus,"
said Dennis Dick, a trader at Bright Trading LLC.
"A Democratic Congress is going to obviously be more
concerned about the small businesses, and the Main Street."
Economy-linked financials .SPSY jumped 1.7%, while
industrial .SPLRCI and materials .SPLRCM sectors hovered
near record highs on expectations that Biden would line up a
bigger fiscal package and boost infrastructure spending with
Congress under Democrat control. Rate-sensitive bank shares .SPXBK gained 2.9%, tracking
another surge in the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yield above
1%. US/
Plain vanilla growth stocks, relatively speaking, are less
likely to benefit from more stimulus spending, said David
Bahnsen, chief investment officer of The Bahnsen Group in
Newport Beach, California.
"Overall value-type stocks probably do better than growth,"
Bahnsen said. "On the margin, if they're going to go get another
$1 trillion and push bond yields higher and the slope of the
yield curve steeper, banks are going to benefit."
The S&P 500 technology .SPLRCT index, up 2.5%, was set to
more than make up for its losses from a day earlier, when shares
of some of the biggest technology companies dropped on fears of
increased regulation.
The NYSE FANG+TM index .NYFANG , which includes the core
FAANG group of stocks that have led the Wall Street rally from
pandemic lows, gained 2.5%.
By 3:00 p.m. ET (2000 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average
.DJI rose 258.83 points, or 0.84%, to 31,088.23, the S&P 500
.SPX gained 56.64 points, or 1.51%, to 3,804.78 and the Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC added 308.16 points, or 2.42%, to 13,048.95.
The number of Americans filing for jobless benefits
unexpectedly dipped last week, while staying elevated, a Labor
Department report showed, with the job market recovery appearing
to stall as the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to overwhelm the
country. "With more stimulus coming, even if we do have a miss on
claims, it's going to be a little bit less severe, because we
know there's going to be a bigger back up for those who are
recently unemployed," said Max Gokhman, head of asset allocation
at Pacific Life Fund Advisors in Newport Beach, California.
Investors are now awaiting a comprehensive December jobs
report, which is expected on Friday.
DXC Technology Co DXC.N surged 8.9% as France's IT
consulting group Atos SE ATOS.PA made a more than $10 billion
takeover approach for its U.S. rival, according to two sources
with knowledge of the matter. Electric-car maker Tesla Inc TSLA.O jumped 6.8% to a
record high, with its chief and billionaire entrepreneur Elon
Musk surpassing Amazon.com Inc's AMZN.O top boss Jeff Bezos to
become the world's richest man, according to a report.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
1.72-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.88-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 97 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 322 new highs and three new lows.